All kinds of Google vs Microsoft news

Bribing consumers to use Live Search: Microsoft announced a new scheme to gain market share against 

Google … bribing people to use its Live search. Under the plan, Microsoft will give users cash back on certain purchases made from advertisers in 18 vertical search categories. The deals will reportedly be available only to Live Search users and the cash-back will be in the form of check, bank deposit or eBay’s PayPal. This, of course means, that users will need to register and give over to Microsoft sensitive financial information in order to use the service.

There are so many things wrong with this plan that hey, it just might work. After all, if phishers can illegally obtain millions of dollars by sending ridiculous e-mails, Microsoft may be able to get consumers to register in droves for its cash-back service. It’s a mixed up crazy world, you know? If Microsoft was to offer a nice hefty cash back on, say, an iPhone — that could be the killer thing (but what’s the likelihood of that?)

Google plays me-too with healthcare records: In October, Microsoft launched HealthVault, an online repository for healthcare records that is maintained by the patient. Today, Google launched Google Health for doing much the same thing. (These two followed others like Revolution Health, and WebMD,

If Microsoft copies Google in everything it does, and Google copies Microsoft in everything it does, will we wind up with two identical online services?

Google scrutinized over privacy issues: Texas Rep. Joe Barton, a top ranking GOP member of the U.S. House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee sent a letter to Google CEO Eric Schmidt on Wednesday. The letter asked for details about Google’s privacy practices since it acquired rival DoubleClick, reports Reuters. Barton wanted to know if and how data collected by Google and DoubleClick about users would be merged, how the data would be used, and if Google planned to continue allowing users to opt out of ad-serving cookies. Barton also asked Google why a new technology to identify who should receive which ads would retain the user’s IP address and the user ID.

Was the letter just for show? Or has Google really brought upon itself a new layer of government oversight, much like its great big competitor in the north?

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